Spiders @ MindSay

So yesterday was Canada day. I decided to spend it with my family (well mother and brother, since father not going to go anywhere), John and Kat did nothing for the day and didn't really seem like they wanted to.

so we left around noon to go to this Downsview park. Apparently free food was promised.  Lots of people there. And sunshine. And both me and mother forgot about sunscreen so now sporting a sunburn >.<
I dont mind it when people promote stuff at large events like that, but I wish they would stop shoving little booklets into my hands. It's always about religion and charity and I am interested in neither. Promote it, but don't bother us.
Anyways, they did have free food, but they had Giagantic lineups for that too. We got our free hot dog and water and didnt wait for the ice cream and cake.

The Canada Day cake was HUGE. But we didn't get to taste it, not only we didn't want to wait in line under the burning sun, but it was too hot for cake.

There was a petting corner with goats and sheep that included creepy crawlers. I got to hold a tarantula. I love the expressions of the people looking at it in this photo. Especially the little horrified kid.  Another photo of me giving the spider back to the guy. And in this one it looks like the father is saying to the little boy "see? even a girl held the spider and you going to chicken out?"

They also had battle re-enactment. They actually did shoot from the guns. From the other side I thought the middle gunman which is blocked in this photo was a young man compared to the old farts around him. turns out it was a woman! I liked that a lot ^^

Dark Knight movie got fancy advertisement. Perhaps I am just not as big of a fan, but for me this is a rent out movie, not one I am looking to watch in the theaters for some reason. Maybe because it lacks the colourfulness of the previous ones (despite being a little embarrassed in general of watching the older movies, they were FUN, and this one being of too dark for me like all recent movies). On the other hand, I won 2 cineplex tickets, which means I can watch 2 movies for free Or one movie and I can treat someone (probably will end up being the second option with me treating kat).

After that we hang around. I lost 5$ trying to play one of those games where you can win a stuffed toy. and didn't get even one ball into the basket. I had no idea why it made me feel like such a retard or a loser and made me feel down in disproportionate extend. performing in front of people makes me nervous (throwing balls is doing something in front of people, for me), so I couldn't even learn from mistakes lol.

we went home for a short intermission. I ate some cookies with green tea and browsed the forums (the NiGHTS forums) and then we left early because we wanted to park our car at the free parking lot at Finch station and walk our way to mel lastman square. As usual my brother was hungry when we arrived so we had to stand in line for a hotdog. I got a hotdog too =p (and ended up dripping mustard on my jeans and my brothers shirt when we were watching fireworks). The fireworks themselves were beautiful. But I gotta say compared to the first years when we came to canada and now , it became lamer. they always play O Canada at the end. Always. They did it at the victoria day fireworks at wonderland. This time they didnt. WTF? also it was very very short. like less than 10 minutes short. It used to be half an hour. And the song selection was uber lame and hardly fit the fireworks (Avril lavignes girlfriend?! c'mon...). Taxes go up, yet quality of life and actual city event's quality going down? LAME! Its canada day, the one day you should totally bling it up.

I was so lonely this weekend that I tried talking to the spiders, one of whom was in my bed with me.  Just a big hairy wolf spider who couldn't possibly understand anything I was saying to it anyway, but at least it was something "right there" to talk to.  Then I realized that the spider was actually chasing an ant and silly me had interrupted its hunt.  So I got out of bed.  Found another wolf spider in the living room in a corner.  As I started to talk to it, it started to crawl over to me, got close enough for me to pick it up if I wanted, but it was more freaked out by me than I of it.

That's when I cried. 

I slept most of the weekend away, unable to do anything creative, and unable to watch a movie to distract me out of my mood.  I dreamed about spiders.  I thought I saw a really big one, like a tarantula crawling over me and leaving thick threads of gossamer all over my bedroom.  Cocooned in this state, I was comforted, like this was the spider's way of hugging me.  Spiders don't cuddle.  They are too soft-bodied.  A hug would kill them.  Then I was given a vision:

A long time ago when the First Man and Woman walked the Earth, Spiders were like dogs and cats, a constant companion to The People.  It was the Grandmother of All Spiders who first weaved a web and taught the people how to read and write, but She didn't do just this one thing.  She also taught people how to make clothing, how to weave baskets, and how to erect sturdy shelter against the elements.  If it weren't for Grandmother Spider and all her children, people would still be living in caves.  For it was in caves that spiders first lived with human beings.  They got along very well with us because the scraps of food we had left over attracted hungry bugs that fed the spiders.  But in the early days of the world, spiders did not have venom.  Like us they had just a good set of jaws.  Spiders would not need venom until, much later the people began to get greedy and they forgot about the wise teachings of the spiders.  But it wasn't just greed that let spiders starve, it was arrogance that really broke the Treaty between the species.  Humans discovered that spiders were so gentle and docile that they were easy to kill.  The Great Spirit took pity on the poor spiders and gave them a bite so powerful that it would forever afterward give spiders the fearsome reputation that they have now.  Great Spirit also gifted Spider with eight eyes and eight legs, just enough to see into any direction so nothing could escape its awareness and just enough leg to jump into any direction so it could better escape an enemy or get the jump on prey.  After the last human took advantage of a spider and was bitten so badly that he died, the people left spider alone.  Looking at this creature with eight eyes now made it seem more alien to humans.  Even though there was evidence all around them of the wisdom Spider gave them, people soon began to forget all the good things spider gave them, and made them the subject of nearly every horror story imaginable till this day.  If Spider were human, it would've gotten terribly lonely, insulted even, but Spider loves being alone in the dark -- it is the best time for hunting and dreaming after all, you know.  Plus hasn't the spider shared enough with the world already?  In their minds, they already rule the world.  They don't even have to big anymore to scare anyone.  And they don't have to speak to get anyone's attention.  That is spider.  The ones who talk without saying a word.  The ones who weave...

I wish I could say that my life has been interesting lately.  I have nothing to report.  So I'm having one of those moments right now where I feel I should be doing something more, that I'm wasting time, but I can't help it, a boredom is growling deep inside of me and there's this constant growing need to be in bed.  I have slept too much over the weekend.  I wanted to get more drawing done, but everytime I approached a blank page, I get tired, I sink down into the couch, I watch a video, I eat something, I take a walk outside, and then come back inside looking as blank as that blank page.  So what do I do during these moments?  First, I try to find something to write about.  If I can't write anything, I find something to look at.  I start to get inspired.  I start to dream out loud.  That fuels my mind.  But there's also the restlessness I feel from not having enough human company.  So I couldn't sleep.  Hugging the blankets wasn't doing it for me.  Early this morning I dragged myself into the computer lab, searching for attention... and searching for something interesting to pay attention to. 

 

I am fast becoming a big fan of Finlay Cowan's work. Infact, I realize now that I've long been a fan, I just didn't realize who he was. I was only familiar with his album covers for Pink Floyd. After I found out that he had a brief stint as bassist for Johnny Thunders (of the New York Dolls), it's no wonder he has a very "musical" style of drawing. His lines flow like sighs and long breaths, a little shaky at the edges, and full of life, like his hands were "dancing" when he was drawing. I find myself falling in love with his style and plan on ordering his graphic novel, Miss London. The novel has the feel of a magazine and a sketchbook complete with poems.  But what I like most about Finlay Cowan is his emphasis on Faeries and Gods.  If you see my work and wonder where some of that inspiration comes from, or you want to learn how to draw a bit like I do, you owe it to yourself to check out Finlay's book Drawing & Painting Fantasy Worlds.  It's the closest book I've come across that explains the way I work!  Seriously, I'm not kidding.  I could easily become friends with this guy.  With a few exceptions, Finlay's style is similiar to mine.  Plus he looks a lot like Peter Murphy.  He kind of looks like a character I would write about.  So not just looking at his work, looking at him I get all sorts of ideas... 

 

I gotta hand it to foreverknight for sending me some episodes of Pushing Daisies. I love how colorful the show is, how each character is infinitely interesting, and how I can't stop re-watching it. What's most inspiring about the show is the style of narration that reminds me of how I tell a few of my own stories -- but not with as much obvious exposition! I like shows and movies that sometimes play out as if someone is reading me a story at bedtime.  I also love stories that have a fairy tale quality, but not dumbed down for a general audience.  I can't wait to watch more.  The show makes me hungry.  For pie.  I have bought and made more pies in the last month than I ever have in one year.  Isn't that funny?   

 

An odd thing that provoked me to sit down and handwrite a short science fiction story about another world; spiders.  It's not because I've had dreams about spiders (I do tend to have a lot of those, but not recently) or that I've seen a spider crawling in my home (a lot of them tend to hang around) but because lately my ears have been "stuffed up" as if I have swimmer's ear or something. A brief moment of panic over my ears (I've never had problems with my ears, so go figure) and I imagined that maybe a tiny spider somehow made a web in my ears.  I know this was just my imagination working overtime, and to change it into an image that was helpful and less stressful on my ears (I've been suffering from differences in biometric pressure due to the weather, not due to any excess of fluids in my ears, thank Gods), I began to meditate on the image of a spider... but not just a tiny one.  Big ones.  Ones that are the size of a dog or cat.  I then began to remember some article or television science show I once watched where someone was experimenting with spider silk to design a more effective form of Kevlar vest.  Can you imagine what the silk of a very large spider would be like?  Or that it could be used to create a very ingenious type of fiber for clothing?  So, after putting drops in my ears to keep the pain of the "stuffiness" at bay, I relaxed into my bed and programmed my mind to dream about large spiders that I could cuddle with and touch -- big, soft, furry spiders like none to be found on this Earth.  Sure enough I got this entire story about a race of human beings whose entire culture is centered around spiders.  I really saw them as real people, as real spiders, in my mind, so real I thought I'd wake up and see them.  In between dream and waking, I felt for certain that they exist.  So I immediately picked up a pen and a blank journal and wrote down everything I could remember about the Spider People.

 

Someday you'll read that story.  For now, I'll just tease you with it.  I'm hungry.  Lunch awaits.  (I've been up since 4am and the day is no where near half way done and I have lots to do yet!) 

 

 

I didn't realize until now, what people can learn about me just by typing "callmeroger" or "call me roger" on Google.